The Third Estate Sunday Review focuses on politics and culture. We're an online magazine. We don't play nice and we don't kiss butt. In the words of Tuesday Weld: "I do not ever want to be a huge star. Do you think I want a success? I refused "Bonnie and Clyde" because I was nursing at the time but also because deep down I knew that it was going to be a huge success. The same was true of "Bob and Carol and Fred and Sue" or whatever it was called. It reeked of success."

Sunday, March 29, 2015

Isakson, Blumenthal Statement on VA’s Expansion of Veterans’ Choice Program

Senator Johnny Isakson is the Chair of the Senate Veterans Affairs
Committee and Senator Richard Blumenthal is the Ranking Member. They
issued this joint-statement last week.

Isakson, Blumenthal Statement on VA’s Expansion of Veterans’ Choice Program

WASHINGTON
– U.S. Senators Johnny Isakson, R-Ga., and Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn.,
chairman and ranking member of the Senate
Committee on Veterans’ Affairs, respectively, today released the
following statement regarding the Department of Veterans Affairs’ (VA)
announced change to the Veterans’ Choice Program's “40-mile rule:”

“We
welcome this important change to a program that is intended to help
ensure thousands of veterans have access to affordable, accessible,
quality health care. For elderly, ill or disabled veterans,
traveling long distances to VA medical centers can be difficult or
impossible. Veterans deserve the highest-quality health care, and should
not be denied this right simply because of where they live. The
Veterans’ Choice Act put in place reforms to address
these challenges and improve veterans’ ability to receive care. We are
pleased that Secretary McDonald is responding directly to concerns
voiced by the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee and other members of
Congress to ensure those reforms are working for
all veterans throughout the nation. This is a common-sense adjustment
to a rule that has the potential to significantly impact the success of
the Veterans Choice Program.”

The
Veterans Choice Program allows veterans to receive health care outside
of the VA if they have to travel more than 40 miles to receive VA care
or if they face more than a 30-day wait time for
care at a VA facility. Currently, the distance eligibility is
calculated "as the crow flies,” leaving many veterans ineligible. The
change announced today will allow the 40-mile provision to be calculated
by driving distance, and will significantly increase
the number of veterans who can take advantage of this program.

###

The Senate Committee on Veterans’ Affairs is chaired by U.S. Senator Johnny Isakson, R-Ga., in the 114th Congress.

Isakson
is a veteran himself – having served in the Georgia Air National Guard
from 1966-1972 – and has been a member of the Senate VA Committee since
he joined the Senate in 2005. Isakson’s home
state of Georgia is home to more than a dozen military installations
representing each branch of the military as well as more than 750,000
veterans.

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Jim, Dona, Jess, Ty, "Ava" started out this site as five students enrolled in journalism in NY. Now? We're still students. We're in CA. Journalism? The majority scoffs at the notion.
From the start, at the very start, C.I. of The Common Ills has helped with the writing here. C.I.'s part of our core six/gang. (C.I. and Ava write the TV commentaries by themselves.) So that's the six of us. We also credit Dallas as our link locator, soundboard and much more. We try to remember to thank him each week (don't always remember to note it here) but we'll note him in this. So this is a site by the gang/core six: Jim, Dona, Ty, Jess, Ava and C.I. (of The Common Ills).